Interior Uses Debt Law to Protect Mountain Valley Pipeline (2)

The Interior Department sought to dismiss a challenge to the Mountain Valley Pipeline project by citing language in the recently enacted debt ceiling law.

Interior and other defendants referenced the Fiscal Responsibility Act becoming law on June 3 in their Wednesday motion to dismiss, saying that there are “several provisions to facilitate the timely final construction and operation of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, which the Act finds and declares is in the national interest.”

The US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit therefore lacks jurisdiction to hear the challenge, because the debt ceiling law “strips this Court of the ...